We had a lot of Nazis right out in the open here in the US in the 1930's. And I don't mean what they call "Nazis" today, I mean 100% legit Nazis. And a lot of them. This idea that if Nazi's are allowed to spread their message openly they will inevitably take over is nonsense and propaganda to get people to support censorship.
> This idea that if Nazi's are allowed to spread their message openly they will inevitably take over
This isn't the claim; the claim is more moderate: Nazis gaining political power, and not necessarily inevitably doing so. Nazis are only an example here; you can substitute any 'wrong' idea to see the analogies, from climate change denial to anti-vaxx to flat earth theories. Further, political power is only the end goal. I think most people would agree that a society where a large percentage of the population consists of (Nazis/anti-vaxxers/climate deniers) who don't vote in themselves would have negative discursive effects socially or politically on those who do vote. The state has power, but it does not have absolute power, and that's a good thing.
Yes but I would say censorship has a greater negative effect. I would be willing to support censorship if it was guaranteed to prevent an inevitable nazi takeover. I do not support censorship against "negative discursive effects."
That's understandable, so we're back to the point I made at the end of my original comment, which is that while we may accept that the best ideas do not triumph in the short run, it's reasonable to think the cost is worth bearing, and it's also reasonable to think the cost isn't worth bearing. I think there are convincing arguments to be made from both points of view. I think it's also worth bringing other democratic ideals into the picture, such as democratic equality, and questioning why (or why not) freedom of speech should always be selected over those other ideals.
For many, some more balancing between the ideals of speech autonomy and democratic equality is strongly justified - see some regulation in Europe for example.
Free speech and democratic equality go together. Censorship means that there is a select group of powerful people that get to decide what ideas are allowed.
They can go together, but they can also conflict. There's lots of argumentation on how hate speech and pornography can undermine democratic equality for minority groups and women respectively. See the SEP article on freedom of speech[0].
I get what the article is saying, but I feel like they are playing word games. Hate speech laws are not increasing freedom, they are trading off freedom for social cohesion, which all societies do to some extent, just not necessarily with censorship.
